Tuesday, 29 May 2018

The Genesis of Kiss Me, Kill Me

I first discovered the work of
James Carol last year with The Killing Game, as together with my fellow readers
at the CWA
Ian Fleming Steel Dagger 2017 Judging committee, noted at
the time -

“Cunningly structured Hollywood hostage drama that boldly
explores the overlaps in fame and news-making between the spheres of media and
terrorism. Carol’s world is peopled with troublingly realistic characters and
disturbs in its portrayal of moral ambiguity. The cinematic pace never slows;
totally absorbing.”

It became one of the six thriller novels that found
itself on the 2017 CWA Steel Dagger Shortlist.

So we were delighted when James Carol agreed to tell us a
little about his follow-up, and how an idea can germinate within a writer.

“Where do you get your ideas” is a question writers
get asked more than any other. The simple answer is that I don’t know where
mine come from. Or rather, I don’t want to know. The fact that they appear at
all is enough. I’m concerned that if I over-analyse things then the alchemy
will stop happening. Ideas tend to pop into my head while I’m going about my
day-to-day life. Some stray thought catches my imagination, collides with
another thought, and before you know it I’ve got something that could maybe be
a novel.

KISS ME KILL ME actually started life as a very
different book. My agent was shopping around for a publisher for THE KILLING
GAME, my first standalone, and needed an idea for a follow-up. I can’t remember
what I was doing when the idea presented itself. Maybe I was in the bath; maybe
I was out for a walk. The idea itself was an intriguing one: what if a woman
woke up one day to discover her husband was a hitman, and that he was out to
kill her. My agent needed a full outline to show to publishers. No problem, I
said.

But it was a problem. A big one. Because that was how
the story remained for years, just an outline. The way I write is to get an
idea and run with it. What keeps me going through the long months of a first
draft is that I’m curious to know how the story will finish. The problem here
was that I knew how this one was going to end.

From time to time I’d revisit the outline, but I
couldn’t bring myself to write the book because that spark wasn’t there. Then
one day I was thinking about it and for some reason I started wondering if the
wife might be pregnant. That was all it took to get me excited again. This one
stray thought fired my imagination and took the story in a brand new direction.
More importantly, though, I now had no idea where it was going to end. I
couldn’t wait to get started.

Once the basic idea has been established the next
stage is to choose a setting. Back in the nineties my parents lived in a small
town just outside Portland, Oregon. The fact I’d been there was a bonus. I
prefer to write about places I’ve visited since it enables you to get that
extra layer of reality. Portland has a laidback arty feel that I thought would
work really well. It’s also a very dynamic city and I wanted that energy in the
book. Getting the right setting is crucial because it influences the whole vibe
of the story.

While I’m working on the location I’m also thinking
about the main characters. These tend to develop from the situation. With
writing the trick is to create a reality that the reader can buy into. That’s
the spell I’m trying to cast. With KISS ME KILL ME, you have a marriage that
looks perfect on the outside but isn’t. Dan, the husband, is charming but
ruthless, two attributes often associated with CEOs. That’s why he ended up
running his own company. Zoe needed to be the opposite of that, so she is an
aspiring writer, the artistic, creative Ying to his single-minded, driven Yang.

The story starts with Zoe at rock bottom and seeing no
way out. When she discovers she’s pregnant she realises she has to do something
because this isn’t just about her anymore. I love it when characters take on a
life of their own and start doing unexpected things. Zoe in particular ended up
being way more resourceful than I thought she would be. Put it this way, you’ll
think you know where this story is going but chances are you’ll be wrong.

A lot of my research tends to be done on the fly and
this is where the Internet is a godsend. With the first draft I just want to
get the words down as quickly as possible; I don’t want the distraction of
spending ages on research as this would disturb the flow of the story. The majority
of my queries can be answered with a quick Google search, and then I can get
back to the business of writing.

Inevitably though there will be something that needs
to be researched in more depth. Amongst other things KISS ME KILL ME gave me an
excuse to look more deeply into the Dark Web. This is basically an alternative
version of the Internet that exists beneath the one that we all know and love.
This is where you can go to buy the sort of things that you don’t find on
Amazon. Drugs, weapons … a murder.

Every book is a learning experience and KISS ME KILL
ME was no exception. It’s not just the characters who end up going into
uncharted waters, I do too. Sometimes it feels like I’m just along for the
ride, and I wouldn’t have it any other way because it’s usually one hell of a
ride.

KISS
ME KILL ME by J.S Carol is published by Bonnier Zaffre on 31st May